Colorado Family Reunion
Growing up with most of my family close-by, I've never had an official family reunion, and the unofficial one I did attend had kind of a major conflict. So, you could say, I was a little nervous about going to a family reunion. Excited, but a little nervous. The idea of being with a group of people you really like for some days straight in an unfamiliar environment... I was hoping I would still like everyone by the end, but more self-consciously, I was hoping they'd still like me.
Fortunately, all was really good. It felt like an actual vacation filled with a lot of fun activities and a lot of great family time. I feel really grateful that I love Matt's immediate family, and even more grateful that I love his extended family too. My favorite day was actually Sunday — when we just hung out all together, and I learned more about their family history and especially Matt's great grand-father Stuart Hatch.
Matt and I arrived on Thursday evening — just in time for dinner. We played games that night and stayed up late talking.
The next morning, we left with many of the group for a white-water rafting excursion. Last summer, when Matt and I rafted the Ocoee River, I've learned Matt's rafting tactics and wanted to steer clear of being behind or next to him to avoid a huge tidal wave of water coming at me (ok, maybe not that dramatic, but the least amount of cold water soaking me is ideal). Fortunately I wasn't placed behind him, but next to him. And since our family needed two rafts, we had a lot of splashing water back and forth anyways to see who could soak the other side best.
Even though the water wasn't very deep, we still had a great time.
In another fun-filled day, we went to do the Alpine Slide at Winter Park Resort with Matt's mom, his grandfather and his cousin. I love those things! You can go as fast or as slow as you want. Apparently this is Colorado's longest alpine slide and includes a chairlift ride to the top.
From there we went to Georgetown! Georgetown is an adorable little town founded in 1859. The historic downtown has all the cute old buildings and we chose one of them for some good Italian food for lunch. My favorite part is the sort-of town square where music was being played. Adam picked up Olivia and Rebecca picked up Clara and they started dancing.
We were in Georgetown primarily so we could take the Georgetown Loop Railroad. It's and old-time steam locomotive that goes through beautiful scenery and past the remains of gold and silver mines. You can choose from open or closed train cars. Matt's brother Adam was especially excited because they had all gone when they were little and now he has kids of his own. It's come full circle.
The finale of the night was the rodeo. It was a small-town rodeo, and unfortunately I had a really awful headache, and there was no fried food. But the rodeo clown gave Matt and I a shout-out for being "newlyweds" and we saw some crazy bull-riding. Just a disclaimer: growing up in Los Angeles, I obviously did not live a ranch life, or a farm life, and some of the things the animals are made to do make me feel uncomfortable, but I think a lot of it depends on the perspective and background you come from.
Finally, here's some family photos Shaena's boyfriend Bo took. Love this family!
